Bad Furnace Noises and What They Mean

Howling, booming, rattling, whistling…

Halloween has long since passed, so why does it sound like your furnace is haunted?

For a furnace repair expert, a furnace making strange noises isn’t the most unusual thing in the world… For the average homeowner, however, this could be quite alarming to them. Below, we’ll explain why your furnace might be making noises and what you need to do about it.

I’m Hearing Something That Sounds Like…

Loud Noises: Has your furnace suddenly become louder? There are various reasons for why your furnace has raised its volume. It could be due to worn out blower fans that need to be replaced.

Boom: A “booming” noise coming out of your furnace is definitely as bad as it sounds. It’s most likely due to an occurrence called delayed ignition. The gas valve will release gas into the burners, but if the gas isn’t immediately ignited, it will build up. When it finally does ignite, all that extra gas will create a small explosion in your furnace.

Whistling: This is almost always due to airflow problems. Gaps in the ducts, clogged filters, and even ducts that are too small can all be causes for whistling. Try replacing the filter to see if that fixes the problem.

Rattling or Vibrating: It could simply be the case that your furnace is vibrating and needs some padding beneath it. If that doesn’t fix it, then it’s most likely due to loosened ducts or parts, and that can be detrimental to the system’s performance.

What Do I Do About These Noises?

For the problems above, we said they “could” be this or it’s “most likely” that. That’s because we can’t say anything certain without investigating the noise for ourselves!

What we can tell you for certain is that a strange noise is your furnace’s way of telling you that something’s wrong. To ignore that would be to invite more damage to your furnace. It will first begin with reduced efficiency as your furnace struggles to operate at normal standards, and after that will come the eventual breakdown (and you can’t always predict just how expensive a breakdown will cost you).

How Do I Prevent My Furnace From Making Noises?

We can’t blame you for wanting to avoid these problems before they happen! While there are the occasional repair problems that seem to come out of nowhere, a large chunk of HVAC problems can easily be prevented with some annual maintenance.

Schedule your appointment with our maintenance program and we’ll get you all set up. For those rare occasions where maintenance doesn’t solve the problem, being enlisted in a program will at least give you a discount on parts and labor.